It is well understood that information visualizations provide insights to the underlying data. For example, for any given set of information, new information regarding patterns or relationships can be obtained by looking at attributes of the information. It is often useful to view the attributes of the information in a hierarchical structure. However, a difficulty lies in displaying large hierarchical structures in a limited display area.
EP 0 435 601 A2, entitled "Display of Hierarchical Three-Dimensional Structures", Robertson, et al., which is assigned to the assignee of the present invention discloses a technique for displaying and manipulating three-dimensional representations of a tree structure which have rotating substructures.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,752,889, entitled "Dynamic, Interactive Display System For A Knowledge Base", Rapport, et al., describes a graphic display that shows links between chunks of knowledge. The user, with mouse clicks, can obtain a display of links from a displayed chunk of knowledge to other chunks of knowledge, which are added to the display. Screen scrolling mechanisms allow movement from one area of the overall graph to another.
EP 0 535 986 A2, entitled "Method of Operating A Processor", Robertson, which is assigned to the assignee of the present invention describes a method for centering a selected node of a node link structure along a centering line. The nodes are in rows, and each row extends across a centering line with links between nodes in adjacent rows. When a user requests a centering operation for an indicated node, a sequence of images is presented, each including a row that appears to be a continuation of the row with the indicated node and that includes a continued indicated node that appears to be a continuation of the indicated node. The rows appear to be shifted, bringing the continued indicated nodes toward the centering line, until a final shift locks the continued indicated node into position at the centering line. The positions of the indicated node and a subset of the continued indicated nodes together can define an asymptotic path that begins at the position of the indicated node and approaches the center line asymptotically until the final shift occurs. The displacements between positions can follow a logarithmic function, with each displacement being a proportion of the distance from the preceding position to the centering line. Each node can be rectangular, and the nodes in each row can be separated by equal offsets to provide compact rows. Each node can be a selectable unit, so that the user can request a centering operation by selecting a node, such as with a mouse click.
Furnas, G. W., "Generalized Fisheye Views," CHI '86 Proceedings, ACM, April 1986, pp. 16-23, describes fisheye views that provide a balance of local detail and global context. Section 1 discusses fisheye lenses that show places nearby in great detail while showing the whole world, showing remote regions in successively less detail; a caricature is the poster of the "New Yorker's View of the United States." Section 3 describes a degree of interest (DOI) function that assigns to each point in a structure, a number telling how interested the user is in seeing that point, given the current task. A display can then be made by showing the most interesting points, as indicated by the DOI function. The fisheye view can achieve, for example, a logarithmically compressed display of a tree, as illustrated by FIG. 4 of Furnas for a tree structured text file. Section 4 also describes fisheye views for botanical taxonomies, legal codes, text outlines, a decisions tree, a telephone area code directory, a corporate directory, and UNIX file hierarchy listings. Section 5 indicates that a display-relevant notion of a priori importance can be defined for lists, trees, acylic directed graphs, general graphs, and Euclidean spaces, unlike the geographical example which inspired the metaphor of the "New Yorker's View," the underlying structures need not be spatial, nor need the output be graphic. FIG. 6 of Furnas shows a fisheye calendar.
EP 0447 095A, Robertson, et al., entitled "Workspace Display", which is assigned to the assignee of the present invention discloses a processor which presents a sequence of images of a workspace that is stretched to enable the user to view a part of a workspace in greater detail. The workspace includes a middle section and two peripheral sections that meet the middle section on opposite edges. Each of the sections appears to be a rectangular two-dimensional surface and they are perceptible in three dimensions. When the user is viewing the middle section as if it were parallel to the display screen surface, each peripheral section appears to extend away from the user at an angle from the edge of the middle section so that the peripheral sections occupy relatively little of the screen. When the user requests stretching, the middle section is stretched and the peripheral sections are compressed to accommodate the stretching. When the user requests destretching, the middle section is destretched and the peripheral sections are decompressed accordingly.